Lime Rock IMSA: Garcia takes sub-50sec pole for Corvette

Corvette driver Antonio Garcia set a sensational sub-50 second lap at Lime Rock Park to snatch pole for the Northeast Grand Prix, one of the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar championship’s GT-only rounds.

GT Le Mans

Garcia's first pole for two years set his best time on the fifth of 11 laps around the seven-turn 1.5-mile course in Connecticut, a 49.754sec, beating Laurens Vanthoor’s #912 Porsche 911 RSR by 0.166sec and Dirk Muller’s Ford GT by 0.191sec.

Tommy Milner was fourth in the second Corvette ahead of Richard Westbrook in the second Ford.

The BMW M8 duo of John Edwards and Connor De Phillippi will start sixth and seventh, ahead of Patrick Pilet’s #911 Porsche.

The Frenchman, who caused a red flag with an off in the 20min pre-qualifying warm-up, never had the pace of his teammate Vanthoor and was barely 0.8sec quicker than the GTD polesitting Porsche.

GT Daytona

Patrick Long set a new class track record with a stunning 51.491sec lap in the Wright Motorsports Porsche.

He was 0.137sec faster than the lead Lexus RC F of 3GT Racing, piloted by Dominik Baumann, while Jack Hawksworth – who needed under-hood work in the early part of the session – did a fine job to snag P3, although he missed the chicane on what should have been his ultimate flier.

Bryan Sellers set a 51.838sec to go P4 in the Paul Miller Racing Lamborghini Huracan, a mere 0.01sec faster than Cooper MacNeil in the Scuderia Corsa Ferrari 488, while Bill Auberlen put the Turner Motorsports BMW M6 into sixth.

The Meyer Shank Racing Acura NSXs were seventh and ninth, split by Ben Keating in the Riley Mercedes AMG GT. John Potter will roll off last in class in the Magnus Racing Audi R8.